Thursday, August 16, 2007

I am the Procrastination Queen in my house! Andrew Grant is one of about 70 authors who are participating in the LKarticlechallenge. Thirty articles are to be written by September 30. Each writer who accomplishes this achievement will receive the Golden PJ’s Award. This is a wonderful exercise for writers who are looking for more exposure and experience in writing articles and networking. In addition, you can expand your learning curve.

Another great reason for entering the LKArticlechallengeis you get to meet great writers like Andrew Grant and you get to give some link love and promote their work. Enjoy this article on how to kill procrastination. I am sure many people will be able to identify and learn from it. I am posting in two parts. Andrew writes:

"I hate procrastination. It is one of the most infuriating parts of my personal make-up and is responsible for so many missed opportunities, wasted hours and failed projects that if it was a person, I’d probably be doing a life sentence for its murder by now.

Fortunately, I’ve found some less violent ways to eradicate this dream destroyer from my life. Here are my 7 top, procrastination beating tips, that will work for you, whether you are climbing a mountain or just tidying up your basement.

Tip #1. Recognize it. You have to know your enemy and procrastination is a master of disguise, so it can sometimes be hard to spot. But when you hear yourself saying things like. “Before I do (my target) I just have to…”, or “I can’t start (my target) till I have…”.

This is what I call the ‘pencil-sharpening mode’ – spending all your time in preparation and never actually doing. Learn to spot these excuses.

Tip #2. Stop it in its tracks. Once you’ve flushed your procrastination into the open, you must take positive action to prevent it taking over. Listen to your excuses and do two things. Firstly, tell yourself to stop being scared of the task you have set yourself and hiding behind these pathetic walls and secondly, incorporate the excuse into the solution, by including it in the next stage.

Tip #3. Define the task. Whatever you want to do, it is no use being nebulous and vague about it. You must define and measure your goal. Write it down, map it out, make it real and tangible and most importantly, take the excuse from stage 2 and include it as part of your road map.For example, if you keep telling yourself that you can’t tidy the basement, till you have gone to the store and bought a set of plastic crates; make “go to the store” the very first step on your goal path."

Hi, my name is Andrew Grant. I hope you enjoyed this article. If you would like to read more great articles on self improvement and making money online, I'd like to invite you to subscribe to my free newsletter, which you'll find at : http://www.money-and-mind.com